All-Time Favorite Writing Prompts

To round out this year of blogging about writing prompts, I polled writers and writing teachers for their favorite writing prompts–generally, simple prompts that have been useful to them as writers, students, and teachers. One such prompt that I found extremely useful in my early days of writing was, “Write about an obsession.” From this straightforward suggestion, I learned a lot about what can drive a compelling story.

Some of these prompts are accessible and instructive; others offer wonderfully evocative images and ideas. For ease of reference, I’ve grouped the prompts into several categories, but certainly some would fit into multiple boxes. It is my hope that these twenty-nine prompts–some specific, some quite open-ended–will help you jump-start any stalled works-in-progress and generate lots and lots of new material.

The Prompts

Accessible

Tell a story about your name. -Lisa Romeo

The basement. -Leslie Pietrzyk

“Momaday saw four things in his life that were truly remarkable…” (Repurposed snippet from the writer, N. Scott Momaday, “The Way to Rainy Mountain.”) -Evan Morgan Williams

Write down a few descriptive objects on a slip of paper, pick one (good for a class). Start the piece with “Why I stole it.” -Swati Khurana

Write in the persona of a character from mythology or fairy tales. -Swati Khurana

I never told my mother . . . -Samuel Autman

Write an apology. -Kristin Griffin

Write about a photograph you love. Describe it in detail; don’t mention it’s a photograph. Only describe what you can see inside the frame. -Irene Keliher

Guilt: Pull three random things from your top dresser drawer. A broken necklace, red silk panties, an expired driver’s license. Now write a poem (or short-short essay) about guilt without using that word. Include all three objects (as nouns, verbs, or any part of speech). End with a question you do not know the answer to. -Christine Hemp

Choose an organ from your body. Do not name the organ. Instead, allow the organ to describe how it feels living inside your body. -EJ Koh

Craft-Focused

Write [x] lines with maximum [x] words, using words of only one syllable. -Éireann Lorsung

Write a story that takes place over six real-time seconds. -Jeff Bender

From Rachel Pollack: Write a story that has no conflict.Helped me understand conflict, that’s for sure. -Anne Bean

Name your alter-ego and describe her in detail. Then write in that voice. -Suzanne Bottelli

This one’s stolen from Deirdre McNamer: Describe the room (usually a dull classroom). Now describe the room from the perspective of a parent who has just found out her child was killed in war. (Meant to exhibit to students how we see feelingly.) -Laura Scott

Describe a house from your childhood using synesthesia. Sounds trigger colors or touch triggers taste. Mingle and use all the senses. -EJ Koh

What does one of your characters not want to do, above all else, and when is he or she closest to doing it? Write that scene. -Erin Gilbert

Write many repetitions of the same scene, with minor adjustments and differences each time, but let one of them differ from the others in that it pivots from banal to grand. -Erin Gilbert

Emotionally Challenging

A fitting punishment -Sarah Frye

What is the worst thing you’ve ever done, and never been caught? -Heidi Czerwiec

Write a story that undermines something you believe in. -Alex Madison

Stories develop from small moments and the insights that come from them. Write about a challenging moment you faced this week and what insights you took away from it. -Clare Meeker

Write about a memory that you (the real or a fictive you) carry alone. -Elizabeth Alexander

What did you always know, or sense, without ever having learned? -Elizabeth Alexander

When working with students who are trying to create narratives out of something very traumatic I give the prompt to write instead about the before or the after. Often times it’s through context and who we’ve become since that helps us find the story. Before the event I: looked like, walked like, thought things like; After the event I: looked like, walked like, thought things like. I then prompt students to write from the before. After they finish that, in a new document, I ask them to write from the after. -Corinne Manning

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About Author

Anca Szilagyi

Anca Szilagyi is a Brooklynite living in Seattle. Her stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Fairy Tale Review, Gastronomica, Propeller, and The Massachusetts Review, among others. She teaches creative writing at Richard Hugo House and was awarded a Made at Hugo House fellowship to complete her short story collection More Like Home Than Home. Her website is ancawrites.com.